


Like Mother, Like Son

by ohthelinsanity



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Eren has heterochromia that dumb bandwagon, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-18
Updated: 2014-04-18
Packaged: 2018-01-19 19:58:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1482085
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohthelinsanity/pseuds/ohthelinsanity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After a shifting experiment leaves Eren with a lot of regeneration to do, he wakes up finding he looks a little more like his mother than he did before.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like Mother, Like Son

Watching over Eren is normally a pain; he’s reckless, he’s loud, and he tends to lose important things, like arms and legs (Jean would argue that he’s lost more than a few brain cells as well). However, watching Eren while he’s  _in_ pain is somewhat easier, at least in terms of keeping track of him.  

Jean’s been assigned to watch over Eren through the night while he’s unconscious and trying to regrow half his body. He wasn’t there when they were performing the shifting experiment, but when the small lot of them (Mikasa, Armin and Hanji all included) returned to headquarters, he could see on their faces it was rough. Mikasa was exhausted from helping the medics make sure vital organs (like his goddamn beating  _heart)_ were still stuffed into that overly-puffed chest of his, so Armin did the explaining. He had lost his right arm and leg, as well as the edges of his abdomen, jaw, and his right eye due to whatever they were doing. The fact that Armin didn’t explain  _why_ Eren lost half of himself was proof enough that the experiment yielded no results.

Hours later, in the wake of early morning sun, Eren finally starts to stir. Jean suspects he could use a little more rest, but due to the fact that Jean had to be up  _all fucking night_ watching him  _regrow his fucking limbs,_ Jean decides his fresh new scar-free baby skin doesn’t really need beauty sleep. Time to wake the big baby up.

“Good morning, sunshine, the world says hello,” Jean says as patronizingly as possible. Eren doesn’t stir in the slightest, but he’s always been really good at ignoring Jean. So for insurance purposes, he decides to keep going. “I’m happy to report your scrawny arm and leg have returned. No reports in on brain function, although I’m sure it’s still shit, as per usual.” he glances at the other side of the bed and peeks at his other arm and leg. Jean’s always relatively surprised that all his limbs regrow perfectly without any hiccups in length, muscle density, or discoloration. The miracle of the human body. Or at least, the miracle of a titan shifter’s body.

Jean keeps talking nonsense for a bit, trying to get Eren to wake up. It’s not  _all_  teasing and cruel intentions—it’s important that he logs how quickly he can recover for future reference. Bugging Eren is just a beautiful, beautiful bonus.

“What if one day you lose half your brain doing this stuff, hmm?” He’s going through hypotheticals at this point—Jean’s tired mind is running out of comedic material. “Do you think that shit’s gonna grow back?” He clicks his tongue, ready for the punchline, and Eren’s body tenses, like he’s preparing for it. “Then again, can’t regrow what you never had.”

“You’re an a _ss,”_ Eren finally croaks out, eyes still closed, as he tries turning his head to the side—he finds his neck is still stiff. There’s no bite in his words—he’s probably in too much pain.

“I can’t be a donkey  _and_ a horse. You gotta pick, Jaeger.”

“Shut up.” His voice still sounds funny to Jean. Getting out of his bedside chair, he inspects Eren’s neck, checking to see if everything was closed and regrown. Closed and ready to go back to straining his vocal chords in no time.

“How are you?” he asks seriously. He mentally starts counting the hours Eren’s been unconscious—seven. Too long to be helpful in a battlefield.

“Feels like someone ripped half my body off, then sewed it back on.”

Jean laughs. “Pretty much what happened, bud.”

Eren pulls a face, eyes still painfully closed. He runs his tongue over his teeth. “New teeth…No wait, just a few.” His brow crinkles in thought. Guess Jaeger really did have that brain. “Did I lose…half my jaw?”

“That’s what Armin said,” Jean shrugs. “It was mostly back to normal by the time you got here.”

“What the fuck was Hanji making me do?”

Frowning, Jean asks, “You don’t remember?”

“No,” Eren says quickly, but grimaces. “…Not at the moment, anyway.” He remedies, but Jean doesn’t buy it for a second. Eren’s memory is a constant frustration for him and everyone else.  There are half a dozen journals in his room full of stories and pictures that he can’t decide are dreams or reality. It keeps him up at night.

With a groan, Jean gets up from the chair—the wood creaks and the sound echoes off the walls. “Alright, Jaeger, I got to check your vitals.”

Eyes still closed, Eren mumbles, “Noo, shh. I’m still sleeping.”

“Sorry. Hanji’s orders. As soon as you were up and talking, that’s when I gotta check.”

“You’re not a fucking doctor.” Eren complains as Jean’s hands go to pull back his blankets; he swats his hands away childishly. “Don’t touch me.”

Jean rolls his eyes. “I don’t have to be one to make sure that all your limbs regrow properly.” Eren still clutches the blanket and starts fake snoring dramatically. “Eren, stop it. Hanji taught me the neurological exam, I did it to you last time, remember?”

A pause. “Once again. No.” But Eren relaxes and lets Jean take the blanket from him anyway.

Jean goes through all the boring steps Hanji taught him—check his reflexes, check his hearing, check his sensation. He leaves his eyes for last, since the kid seems adamant on pretending to sleep through the whole thing, leaving him with mumbled “yes, no, left, right” answers.

“Eyes. Open them.”

Eren makes some strangled noise in protest. “Ugh, the world is going to be  _way_  too bright.”

Jean chuckles. “Don’t care.” He flicks Eren on the bridge of his nose, making him scowl. “Open.”

He opens his eyes as asked, and Jean yelps.

“Dude!” Jean admonishes. “Your eyes!”

“I know, I know. Try not to get too mesmerized.”

“No, no…something went wrong.”

“Huh?”

It’s a strange sight, and while it looks cool enough, Jean feels guilty about praising Eren’s perfect regeneration streak moments before. Eren’s eyes were always this green color that looked like grass and sky bled together, but his new eye is  _brown,_ a coppery and muddy color that looks all wrong with his permanent snarl and furrowed brow.

Jean waves his hand in front of his face. “Can you see out of both your eyes?”

“Yes,” Eren says slowly, confused and not picking up on what Jean’s seeing.

“No blurry vision?”

“No.”

“No distortions? Color absences?”

“No.”

“Same colors in  _both_ eyes, yes?”

“Yes. Jean, what’s this about?”

 “Your eye is brown.”

Eren rolls his newly mismatched pair of eyes. “No, you moron, my eyes are  _green.”_ He leans over and pokes Jean in the chest. “Maybe I should be the one checking your eyes.”

“No,  _one_  of your eyes is green,” Jean corrects, and he looks around. “The one that regrew,” he goes to the corner of the room and fetches a small mirror and hands it to Eren, “is  _brown.”_

Eren lets out a yelp that was similar to the one Jean gave. “Oh  _shit,_ ” He whispers. “I don’t think this is supposed to happen.”

“To be fair,” Jean scratches his chin, “I don’t think re-growing  _any_ organs is supposed to happen.”

“Touché.” Eren stares at his reflection, trying to spot the difference in his eyes. “But why  _brown?”_

Jean shrugs. “Dunno. But people have brown eyes. It’s not that strange.”

“I know. My mom had brown eyes.  _You_ have brown eyes.” He mumbles, staring at his reflection. He remembers townspeople telling him how he looked just like Carla, and he sees it now. “But people’s don’t really change color.”

“Yeah, but you’re not most people.”

“Touché, again.”

“I guess….” The word is sloppy on his tongue as Jean stretches, clearly opening his mouth before he has thought the whole sentence through. “Your brain messed up and sent the color for your mom’s eyes instead of yours.” He gives another shrug. “Mikasa said you look— _looked_ —a lot like her. So I guess you have a lot of her traits in you, huh?”

Eren puts the mirror down. “Yeah, maybe…”

“That biology stuffs tricky. I tried reading one of Hanji’s books about it, but I couldn’t understand a word.  Armin had an easier time. We’ll go ask both of them, I’m sure we’ll figure it out.”

“I don’t think it’s a big deal. I can see just fine.”

"It’s weird," Jean tells him. "Makes you look funny."

"I think it looks cool," Eren argues, but he doesn’t sound very assured.

"What the hell do you know about cool?" He pauses and leans over, checking out both Eren’s eyes again. "Look, you might be able to see fine now, but there could be complications later on."

"If I go blind, I’ll tell you." Eren sighs. “Really, Jean. Don’t worry about it. It’s not even that noticeable. ”

A silence washes over them and because Jean doesn’t do awkward silences, he decides it is best that they go back to their banter. “You know, I could always gouge your eye out and you can try re-growing it again.”

“Yeah, no, I think I’m good.” He says flatly, but there’s a wisp of a smile on his lips.  He picks up the mirror again and looks at his reflection. “Yeah. I’m definitely good.”

Jean grins. 

**Author's Note:**

> Eren being happy that he has one of his momma's eyes that's why I wrote this fic bye.
> 
> EDIT: fixed a couple of errors, tidied up some of the language


End file.
